If it weren't world wide, then why did Noah take 120 years to build the boat? Think how far he could have traveled in 120 years.
I don't know if it took him 120 years and neither do you.
The Bible speaks of "mea v'esrim shana". "Shana" means "year" in modern Hebrew but originally simply meant "repeating unit", from a root WNT (the W is a /sh/ sound) that means, from what I can find, "alter", "repeat", and "learn". The flood story is of Sumerian origin and was included in the Bible simply because it was true and part of Israel's (the people) history.
But what unit of time the Sumerians used I don't know. Could be months, or seasons, or even days.
Unless one of us studies Sumerian I doubt that we can identify which value we have to change.
I am also not sure if Genesis says that it took him 120 "shana" to build the ark. The reference to "120" I can find is the following.
"6:3 And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years." (King James)
Where do you get the number 120 in relation to the ark? I am not super-familiar with the text.
Why did Noah bring the animals into the ark? Animals are quite capable of going to higher ground on their own. There must have been a reason for this. Perhaps because there was no higher ground to go to? The following quotes came from Genesis Chap 7
Please don't ask questions about the obvious. When you have family and animals and someone reliable tells you about a flood affecting your land, you will obviously use your boat to save your family and your animals. Animals are quite capable of going to higher ground on their own. Indeed.
The problem here is that that is exactly what they would have done. And who wants to lose seven cows and seven sheep and the two family dogs to whichever neighbouring population they run to?
"And Noah was 600 years old when the flood of water was upon the earth."
The text is
"V'Noach ben shesh meot shana v'haMabul haya mayim 3al haAretz."
Note that "ben [some number] years" is in Hebrew the way to say "(male) [some number] years old", as in "Ani ben shloshim." ("I (male) am thirty [years old].").
I also had to look up "mabul" ("deluge").
So translated we get:
"And Noach [is/was] six hundreds shana [old] und the deluge was (some past tense of "to be") water on the land."
("Mayim" could be Geneitive, hence "flood of water" would be correct.)
It doesn't say "earth" (as in the planet), but "earth" as in "ground". The word "eretz" is most often used to refer to simply "land" or a specific land (often Eretz Yisrael). Eretz never means "earth, the planet". Even in the first sentence of Genesis the word refers to "earth" as in "opposite of heavens", i.e. "the ground".
"Shana", as I said, means "year" in modern Hebrew, but in older times meant any repetitive unit. If we assume "months", Noach would have been 50 years old at the time, which pretty much matches the description of his character. Since the story is Sumerian, we would have to find out what Sumer's base unit was for age in stories. The Hebrew version of the story (given to the Jews by G-d, if you will) would simply use the Hebrew word for the same concept, but the dimensions could be different.
Think "billion" and "milliard" (A British "billion" is one million millions). The Prussian mile is also ten times longer than the British mile. This is normal and has to be taken into account.
Either way, you have to remember that Abraham was not 600 _year_ old when _the earth_ was flooded, but 600 _shana_ when _haAretz_ was flooded. Those words do not map exactly to the English words you focus on.
"Of clean beasts and of beasts that are not clean and of fowls and of every thing that creeps upon the earth."
This is interesting because the word used here is not "eretz" ("land") but "adama" ("earth", the material; what "Adam" is made off, a word game in Genesis).
The word here refers not to land or the earth at all, but to a type of animal. We have beasts (like cows and sheep), birds, and those things that creep on the "earth material", maybe snakes etc..
So why was Noach supposed to bring snakes? I don't know what types of reptiles people then kept for what reasons. Phoenicians kept sea snails for purple a few hundred years later. Or perhaps those "earth material" animals included cats and dogs, I don't know.
Suffice it to say that G-d certainly could save animals from a world-wide flood without the need for a boat.
Either way, whichever word you want to translate as "earth" ("eretz" or "adama"), the two are NOT the same.
"And it came to pass after seven days that the waters of the flood were upon the earth."
Again, it says "on the land", not "upon the earth".
"And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth and all the high hills that were under the whole heavens were covered. Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail and the mountains were covered. And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both fowl and of cattle and of beast and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth and every man."
Again, it says "on the land". And I am not sure how high the hills are in southern Iraq (where Sumer was). I think it is mainly swamp land. The word for "hill" or "mountain" in Hebrew is "har", which is also used here. But a "har" is not what we (Europeans and Americans) think of as a mountain. I have seen "harim" ("mountains") in Jerusalem that I wouldn't even have noticed as such in Europe.
The highest "har" I can think of is Har haKarmel in Haifa, which is well under 2000 feet. I would be surprised if there were any hills higher than a few hundred feet anywhere in the marshlands of southern Iraq, let alone in Noach's kingdom.
Reading the Bible LITERALLY, the whole world or planet is never mentioned in Noach's story.
